ST. BONAVENTURE, N.Y. — St. Bonaventure’s Dion Wright and Xavier Smith will both participate in European basketball tours starting this week.
Organized and managed by Global Sports Academy, the goodwill tours feature teams of players primarily from NCAA Division I schools. Both Wright’s and Smith’s teams will play five games against local teams while experiencing the culture and history of Europe.
Wright, a 6-7 forward, will be a junior at St. Bonaventure this coming year. Last season, he finished fourth on the team in scoring at 8.7 points per game, and third on the squad in rebounding at 4.8 per contest. One of the most improved players in the Atlantic 10 Conference, he more than doubled all of his production from his freshman season. Smith, a 6-8 forward, played in 10 games last season as a freshman.
Wright’s team will travel through Germany, Belgium and England. His teammates are Jalen Carethers (Radford), Patrick Wallace (North Carolina State), Dion Wiley (Maryland), Khliad Nwandu (Mount St. Mary’s), Steven Spieth (Brown), Javion Ogunyemi (Siena), Lavon Long (Siena), Cory Blake (West Chester) and Logan Stumpf (West Chester). Siena assistant Greg Moore is the head coach. Wright and his teammates open their five-game slate on Friday against Melsele in Brussels, Belgium. The team will play four more games Aug. 16-19, then return to the United States on Aug. 21.
Smith’s team is coached by Patrick Baldwin, who is an assistant coach at Northwestern, and includes Tre Harris III (Kansas State), Kris Jenkins (Villanova), Darryl Reynolds (Villanova), Nathan Taphorn (Northwestern), Jordan Threloff (Northern Illinois), Ben Moore (SMU), Sterling Brown (SMU), Jarvis Pugh (Santa Clara), George Marshall (South Dakota State) and Bradley Hayes (Georgetown). The team’s first game was on Wednesday in Amsterdam against Soba, with games each of the following four days. The team will also make stops in Germany, London and Belgium for games.
